Mother's Embrace

Mother's Embrace | Photographed by Terry Madsen

Kathmandu, Nepal

The Story of the Image by Terry Madsen

This image was photographed on my second trip to Nepal. I am fortunate that humanitarian work affords me the opportunity to travel to different places around the world and Kathmandu Nepal is one of the most exotic places one will ever visit. After spending a week doing humanitarian work in the Lamjung region of Nepal with Choice Humanitarian in 2010, I spent a week in Kathmandu just exploring the city and surrounding UNESCO heritage sites-taking thousands of photographs. One of my favorite places to visit, Swayambhunath, or the Monkey Temple was within walking distance from my hotel. Although I took hundreds of photos of Swayambunath in 2010, I did not really have any good photos of the Rhesus monkeys that are found all over the area. Upon my return in 2012 I walked to Swayambhunath again VERY early in the morning with the temple pilgrims and well before the tourists would arrive. It was at the bottom of the 365 steps that lead to the Buddhist Temple that I spotted a few Rhesus monkeys calmly grooming and resting in the early morning light. I was able to take 3 images of the Rhesus mother and baby before they scampered away. In the first two images the mother was looking right at me and the baby was hiding his head. For the third image in what I consider a moment of serendipity, the baby looked out and the mother turned her head the opposite direction creating a dynamic composition in this 'Monkey Portrait'. The only editing I have done was to lighten up the baby's face which was a little in shadow and darken small distracting highlights. Technical details for the photo: Camera was a Canon Rebel T1i w/ Sigma 18-200 lens, ISO 400, f/ 6.3, 1/60 sec.

This image has become a 'signature image' for me as it continues to win awards.